Tuesday, 12 June 2012

The Origin Of Elrod

I thought Cerebus the Aardvark was great and thoroughly enjoyed the Elrod sequence, particularly the bit with the black blade. My only complaint - and it's hardly that - is that the Elrod drawn derives from no description of mine, but from Barry Smith who used Jack Gaughan's Elric covers for Lancer as a model. Jack Gaughan's ideas were all his own and did not follow my descriptions at all. Interesting to see a third generation version. Thanks for Cerebus. I look forward to issue 7!

I distinctly remember a day, in the midst of drawing issue #3 when I suddenly started laughing hysterically. When Deni asked me what the problem was, I sort of gasped, "Elric. Picture Elric saying 'Mind yo' mannuhs, son. I've got a tall pointy hat." She looked at long and hard with that "My God this time you've finally flipped." look of hers. I knew I was on to something. For the next few days, however, when anyone came over to see us, Deni would insist that I tell them. I got a lot of blank looks. I laughed a lot myself, but no one else did.

To be honest, I don't even know where the connection came from. Wendy Pini's jaw hit the floor when I told her that I had never read an Elric story. "But it's perfect," she managed to insist, "the way he's always talking non-stop - it's just like Elric. You've got to read one of the stories so you know how good the parody is." That was last summer and I still haven't read an Elric story - except of course for the Roy Thomas/Barry SmithConan issues he appeared in.

1 comment:

It is a point of great pride for me that I was asked by Oliver Simonson to do the voiceovers of Elrod for Oliver's Cerebus 3D movie. To my knowledge, I was his first and only choice. For 30 bucks and about a half hour's time, I laid it down in two or three takes in a professional sound studio located in the wild woods (literally) of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Can't wait to get that voiceover credit if the movie is ever released (Dave Sim is still on the fence about it). Plus, it was a hell of a lot of fun to do Elrod for audiences every time I've done it. (See You Tube)